


Wolves not Shepherds

by cognomen



Category: King Arthur (2004)
Genre: Alpha Galahad, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Knotting, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Omega Tristan, PWP
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-13
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-03-22 17:46:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3737851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cognomen/pseuds/cognomen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"What is there to fear?" Galahad asks, his tone indignant. "There are no enemies to scout, Arthur, this isn't fair."</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Galahad finds himself regarded passively by his commander’s unmoved eyes. Arthur is listening to his protests, but he will not relent. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>"It's his duty Galahad. The rest of us will take our ease only fully to know we are safe."</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>It isn't fair, but Tristan had not protested the assignment, instead accepting the sacrifice of several days of his leave in favor of a sudden, senseless scouting mission with no complaints.</i>
</p>
<p>In which Tristan has been hiding something, and Galahad discovers it. A/B/O fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wolves not Shepherds

"What is there to fear?" Galahad asks, his tone indignant. "There are no enemies to scout, Arthur, this isn't fair."

Galahad finds himself regarded passively by his commander’s unmoved eyes. Arthur is listening to his protests, but he will not relent. 

"It's his duty Galahad. The rest of us will take our ease only fully to know we are safe."

It isn't fair, but Tristan had not protested the assignment, instead accepting the sacrifice of several days of his leave in favor of a sudden, senseless scouting mission with no complaints.

Without the support of the wronged party, Galahad is arguing on no one's behalf.

He sees no chance for relent in Arthur's eyes, and feels his anger grow, his helplessness offering no immediate outlet.

He turns his ire on Tristan, then, confronting the scout as he makes ready to go, calm as slowly moving clouds in the sky.

"Speak up for yourself," Galahad challenges. "You deserve a break as much as the rest of us."

Tristan pulls his girth tight, regarding Galahad with impassive eyes. Then he hesitates, long enough that Galahad catches sight of the amusement hiding in the dark depths of his eyes. 

"Spending my time amongst drunk knights is not so diverting a reward as you might think," he offers by way of answer to Galahad's indignant demand. "Scouting affords privacy, views, and time alone. I will be back in four days."

It is not a satisfying answer, not the point that Galahad was trying to make on Tristan's behalf, but he can offer no effective argument to the other knight's more solitary nature.

Tristan was a knight among them and at ease alone, patient and confident. 

That does not mean he should be forced to work while the others relaxed and paid no mind, simply because they had decided it made no difference to them whether Tristan was given his fair due.

Galahad watches him depart,certain whether he minded or no, he should not be forced to spend his leave alone scouting for enemies that would not be there.

He debates it through the rest of the day, the thoughts churning and heavy in his mind, refusing to rest. He sits silent and angry through supper, and takes wine enough to forget.

-

Somewhere between bidding his brothers good night and stumbling back to his bed, the idea forms.

If Tristan would not keep the time that should by rights be his, Galahad would bring it to him instead. It would not be so difficult to appropriate several skins of wine and find the scout.

He convinces himself of it with more than a little help from the wine he has already imbibed. 

His steed eyes him warily as Galahad pulls him from the stall in the dark of night, disliking the break from routine.

When he has the animal saddled, Galahad briefly wonders if his company will be welcome.

"If we can't find him, we'll come home," he tells his displeased horse.

After all there is no doubting who is the better woodsman. If Tristan wants to avoid Galahad, then Galahad will not so much as see him.

He slings two wine skins at the pommel of his saddle and after a brief consideration, pauses to wrap the remains of dinner up to take with him.

Thus burdened, Galahad lifts himself clumsily into his saddle, ignoring the disapproving snort his horse gives, and turning for the woods where Tristan had disappeared earlier in the day.

It does not occur to him to wonder exactly how much lead time Tristan has, to wonder how hard the scout has ridden toward the perimeter that Arthur wanted ridden. 

No matter what, Tristan will have long since stopped to rest, affording Galahad a chance to catch up. If he is wise in anticipating the path Tristan had taken, perhaps before morning.

He follows the signs of passage, faint though they are.

They fade quickly, leaving Galahad to guess which direction Tristan had decided to ride his circuit.

He hesitates then, feeling his wine-leant confidence waver just slightly. Galahad halts and looks up at the stars, feeling for his instincts.

A strange scent touches against his awareness, just the barest hint of something he has never smelled before.

He finds himself turning his horse in that direction and sighs, chuckling to himself. It is as good a way to decide as any other.

-

It grows stronger, the sweet-spicy cloying smell, as Galahad carefully follows it, his head held high to try and catch any hint of it, changing direction when it seems to fade.

It goes on, touches him in some hindbrain he had not felt connected to since he had been far younger. Alluring, intense; intoxicating in a way that even the wine hadn't been. 

He realizes exactly what it is only slowly, only when he finds his pulse beginning to elevate, his mouth wet with saliva as if he were a man starving. 

An _omega_ , alluring and calling out in early heat. It wakes instincts in Galahad long dormant - a want, a _need_ to dominate and possess. To stake his claim with his teeth and body.

Arthur had been shocked to find Galahad to be an alpha, having pulled the boy aside when he was newly recruited to ascertain Galahad was not an omega himself. 

He allows that he does not fit the usual profile, but there was no denying biology and instinct with the burden of proof of his nature. 

It had proven stronger even than his mission, this biological urge.

He pulls his horse to a stop, debating. This is not why he's out here, nor can he really risk the slim chance of finding a true Mate, not wanting to intrude if this omega already had an alpha. 

It is that thought that sticks. Perhaps the scent had caught Tristan's attention, too.

If he is an alpha, it is likely.

His curiosity - and the drive to keep going where his instincts are pulling him - get the better of him. 

When the smell is enough to cloud his mind, Galahad dismounts, uncertain why he would feel the need to approach in stealth, but there is no sign of a settlement out here. Whoever is here is alone - and he catches no scent of any other alphas.

They had come to be alone, somewhere they would not be followed. Galahad will only look, he tells himself as he moves forward, sinking low as if he were a stalking animal. If he is not welcome, he will continue his hunt for Tristan.

A low moan stops him in his tracks, sobering and sudden in its familiarity. 

He pushes through the last of the thick undergrowth, and finds that both his targets have become one and the same.

-

Tristan is naked, laid out in his own bedding in comfort, or at least as much as he can manage out here alone.

There is no question as to the origin of the scent, it's strong enough now to pluck at Galahad's nerves like fingers against lyre strings.

It is a new heat, and the scent is not as strong as Galahad has experienced before, but now it is hooked into his senses and pulling.

He watches Tristan's hands work on himself, touches light and teasing. His fingers are curled around his own cock, stroking now without the fevered desperation Galahad knows will come, and his other hand settled over his hip, stroking lightly down the underside of his cock and beyond, into the flushed pink lips that surround the opening behind; clear evidence that he is an omega. Only they have such an unusual blending of both genders. 

Of a sudden, the strange assignment makes sense to Galahad Sending Tristan out to spare him the chaos he would cause amongst the knights - mostly betas, by Galahad's guess. Not Arthur, certainly. Perhaps not Lancelot, either.

To keep it hidden so long was clever, implying a deliberate choice of Tristan as scout.

If not for this inconvenience of timing, no one would have questioned Tristan's needed absences, hidden as they were amongst all those that truly were only to scout.

Nearly no one had questioned _this_.

Galahad's mouth is watering, his senses assaulted by it - but only now that he is practically on top of Tristan.

He should have sensed it much sooner. 

He should have sensed it the moment he'd gotten close enough for a real sniff. They all should have, at the very least the alphas among them. But only Arthur seemed to know. 

Galahad would wager that perhaps Lancelot was also aware. 

He swallows hard, tasting Tristan's pheromones as they flood the air, his senses seeming to hone in on it. Locking in like a hook in the mouth of a fish, like an arrow sinking barbed beneath his skin. He licks his lips, finding the wine skin dangling from one hand.

He tries to wash the taste from his mouth, telling himself that he is unwelcome, that Tristan has isolated himself to avoid a mating with his brothers. Galahad tells himself to go home, to turn around, get back on his horse and return to his own quarters, to lose himself in drink and the pleasures of his leave.

Then the low, pleasured growl of Tristan finding his first release reaches him, tailed with the rush of his panting breath. The scent of him grows stronger, the rush of slick visible even as thin streams of cum pour out of his cock. Galahad tells himself to _go_ , and then steps into the clearing.

"Tristan," he says, calling out to the omega without intending to. His voice is a growl, a demand. A sound answers - not a gasp but a _snarl_ in response. Galahad's pace quickens.

Tristan rolls to all fours, eyes fierce and posture wary, challenging. Galahad finds the notion of fighting for what he wants until he can prove himself by conquering the omega irresistibly alluring.

" _Scouting_ , Tristan?" Galahad teases.

In answer, Tristan shows his teeth, wrinkles his nose in a growl. His posture relaxes some, the tension going out of his bunched shoulders when he recognizes Galahad through his haze. 

He can't find Galahad's presence utterly undesirable. Galahad steps closer, still edging in as if wary that Tristan might lash out, though he is armed only with his teeth and strength, it is enough to do damage. He is a soldier, still.

" _Spying_ , Galahad?"

"I came to make sure you could also enjoy your leave," Galahad explains. He displays the wine skin in his hands as if in defense, reaching a distance just outside Tristan's ability to lunge. He circles then, wary to answer wariness. 

"I was," Tristan answers.

"Wouldn't you better enjoy it with company?"

A snarl. Galahad's body answers, blood rushing to his cock, hardening him in his pants. Beneath his skin, his blood crawls alive and hot as fire. He _wants_.

Tristan sits up on his haunches, giving himself a doglike shake. Galahad sees him trying to clear his mind, showing his sharp, wolfish teeth as he fights against heat-driven instinct. It isn't a decision that _should_ be made in the rush of heat; the potential of finding themselves true mated should be discussed. It's too late now.

"I don't think you _can_ " Tristan challenges instead, no meek omega even on the cusp of overwhelming hormones and drive. The insult is clear - the intent clear. Galahad manages to re-cork the wineskin before letting it fall. 

He stalks into Tristan's space, shedding his cloak, his shirt. Tristan takes him off his feet when he is trapped and blinded in the fabric. He has the advantage of size, of adrenaline. He pins Galahad and closes his teeth on the bared skin of Galahad's bicep, pinching. Bruising. Getting his hands tangled in the shirt to keep it over Galahad's head and arms and bind him with it.

"You would try to command _me_?" Tristan growls against his skin. "Without _earning_ the right? Without fighting me for my own will?"

Nails rake over Galahad's belly, and then he finally fights his way a few inches further out of his shirt, galvanized. Suddenly, it constricts tighter around his head and arms, twisting and confining Galahad until he feels the heat of his own breath trapped against his mouth by the fabric.

The world feels hot and small, and Galahad fights to get free of the constriction.

"You'll bleed for your audacity," Tristan's mouth moves against Galahad's belly and he can feel Tristan's throat moving against his groin, the heat of his skin even through the layers of fabric. Then his teeth close - _hard_ on the soft, vulnerable skin at their mercy.

Galahad jerks, twisting and bucking, and feels some embarrassment. This isn't how such matings went - never has he heard alphas tell of how they fell utterly at the mercy of their omegas. Neither has he heard any of them claim that they had been marked _first_.

This is not a claim but an aggression. He kicks out, catching Tristan and throwing his weight against the omega to try and unseat him. A ripping sound brings cool air at last against his mouth, fresh feeling oxygen into his lungs.

"Submit," Galahad commands, though he's hardly in the position to do so, he is at last freeing his hands from his shirt.

Tristan laughs at him, half a growl. "Make me."

"I was waiting for you to ask," Galahad answers, though he had been doing nothing of the sort. He claws one hand down Tristan's back, and it arches up to his touch in a perfect omega reflex. The other he gets into Tristan's hair, pulling until he can get enough leverage.

They descend into scrabbling and wrestling. Tristan fights dirty, clawing and biting, digging calloused fingertips into pressure points when Galahad pulls his hair. It's feral and vital, as much fight as play, wavering back and forth over the line of real danger before Galahad finally manages to find an advantage.

He pulls until Tristan's neck bares itself to him and then leans in, sinking his teeth hard against the junction of shoulder and neck. It is one mark in revenge to the several purpling on his own skin. When Tristan quiets instinctively, Galahad's skin feels red and raw over every exposed part of him. The red lines carved into his hide by Tristan's nails and teeth seem to throb in pace with his rapid pulse.

Even here, Tristan does not submit fully without a fight. Galahad feels his arm moving through the anchor of his closed teeth on Tristan's shoulder, and then a strong hand closes over the bulge his straining cock makes in his pants. Tristan squeezes - just hard enough.

Galahad's pained gasp loosens his teeth and Tristan laughs, taking the upper hand again. 

Galahad's mother had never described what his mating might entail in terms like this. She had stressed the need to learn to curb and hold his violence in. She had described being gentle with his omega, but had never mentioned what to do if an omega was not gentle with _him_.

He decides that all is fair, as in war, and Galahad eases the hand that isn't helplessly tangled into Tristan's long, messy hair free. He closes his fist around Tristan's half-hard cock and finds it slick with precum, Tristan dripping wet behind. Hot drops of slick patter against Galahad's clothed thighs, promising readiness.

"I can give you what you want," Galahad growls his promise, letting go of Tristans' cock to hook two fingers into his hot, slick cunt instead. "What you _need_."

Tristan's body welcomes his curling, penetrating fingers to the hilt. His eyes are dark heat, wide pupils, dark irises, and they seem to plunge as deeply into Galahad as his fingers currently are in Tristan.

"Need?" he snarls. Galahad will get no where with backtracking and denial. He will not advance - with Tristan anyway - without proving himself a conquerer.

" _Need_ ," Galahad asserts, hooking his fingers hard against the roof of Tristan's cunt and rubbing until the pressure and pleasure call up the overwhelming instincts to be filled. Perhaps neither of them need this;

But how they _want_ it.

Tristan must feel the same hollowness, the ache that will only end for a time when he is stuck fast on Galahad's swollen knot and filled with it until they are inseparable. Until they are bred together, taking and taken in equal parts. In answer, Galahad feels flushed and cold with sweat, exposed and bare. Desperate to be allowed to please Tristan as an omega, to get them both where they want to be.

"Submit," Galahad tries the command again, pulling his voice up from deep in his chest. He doesn't expect it to work, it hadn't the other times, but perhaps in combination with the pressure of his fingers, he feels Tristan begin to bend his body into an arch over Galahad's own.

It pushes bared skin against his own, filling Galahad's vision with sharp teeth as slick drips down his wrist. Tristan finally frees his grip from Galahad's arms, releasing pressure points and waking a chorus of sore aches beneath his skin. He claws for Galahad's pants then, unlacing his breeches in hard tugs.

It takes two sets of hands to get him out, and then the pants themselves are thrown carelessly into the air, fluttering away to land in a heap. Galahad transfers his hold back to Tristan's cock, then he loses his grip as Tristan slides lower.

Galahad is not entirely sure he wants Tristan's teeth near his cock just now. He tugs warningly at Tristan's hair, and Tristan looks up at him, low over Galahad's belly where he is crouched like a tiger, and the two blue stripes on either cheek only lend to that image. 

He fists his hand around Galahad's filling cock as if testing the heft of it. Then he extends his tongue while Galahad watches, making a long swipe up the underside of Galahad's cock, lingering over the slight swell of his knot and then again under the head.

Galahad is nearly hypnotized by the sensation, the faint roughness of Tristans' tongue, the loose friction of his own foreskin against the sensitive head of his cock. Tristan eases it back and closes his fevered mouth over the skin, sucking until Galahad gasps and arches.

He curls his hands into claws over Tristan's shoulders, and then pushes until Tristan relents, until Galahad can finally shove him over to his own advantage.

He shoves Tristan down onto the blanket covered grass, growling, and bites Tristan's bare shoulder until he gasps and arches, until his body is begging even if his words aren't. He strokes Tristan's cock with his wet fingers, demanding, and keeps hold with his teeth until he's sure there will be a mark. His strokes are rough, relentless, and he ignores the warning growls that issue from Tristan, he ignores it when they turn to half desperate whimpers.

Galahad drives him to the edge and over it, feeling cum spurt hot in his fist and the mournful groan that echoes through both of them. _Not enough._ He gives Tristan a moment to stop seeing stars. 

"Submit," he growls again, and this time the tone is lower, but is steely hard. "Or so help me that's the only release I'll give you."

Tristan groans at the thought of so much deprivation. His voice is softer, without so much conviction as before. "As if you could-"

"I could," Galahad assures him, trailing his fingers through the mess on Tristan's stomach. He is not as sure as his tone implies. "If you care to _try_ me."

Galahad isn't sure if he's fully committed as he begins to lift himself away - he can feel every scratch and tooth-mark left on his skin. Whether it is a bluff or not, Tristan arrests his movement with a tight grip at the back of Galahad's neck.

"What do you want?" Galahad prompts, pushing his fingertips against Tristan's belly and pressing, drawing his attention to the void.

Tristan digs his nails into the back of Galahad's neck, hard. It's a sharp pain that digs through the haze in Galahad's mind the same way Tristan's fingertips seem to find their way through the cords of muscle and to the bone beneath. He leans up, puts his mouth against Galahad's ear.

"I submit," he says.

They part only briefly and in that instant things go soft between them. They touch gently, kiss instead of bite, stroke skin instead of scratching it. Tristan breathes warm across Galahad's bruised skin before he shifts, turning and lifting himself. Galahad runs his palm - made flat and broad with spread, possessive fingers - over the curve Tristan makes with his spine. 

He runs his hands down the tense lines of Tristan's crouched thighs, gathering slick before he strokes it over his own length and enough to spare to leave his hand sticky and slippery. Tristan crouches lower, deepens his arch when Galahad eases over him. 

He can see the flash of Tristan's teeth closing on his own knuckles as he lines up to guide himself in. The long, slow slide as he feels Tristan stretch to take him is met with an impatient growl, Tristan shifting his knees and reaching back to scratch a harsh line over Galahad's ass - causing him to jerk forward - away and toward, sinking deep.

Tristan breathes out a satisfied grunt, pushing back against Galahad almost hard enough to throw his balance. Instinctively, he gets hold of Tristan's hips, leans down over him.

"Impatient," Galahad scolds.

"I won't beg," Tristan answers, his tone distant and breathy as Galahad begins to move. "If you keep holding back I'll push you off and show you how it's done."

The idea is promising - perhaps meant as a threat but it sends a pulse of interest down Galahad's spine to his cock, and demand for the exploration of that proposal - _later_. For now he demonstrates that he does not need the lesson.

He pushes hard, once, reaching down with one hand to anchor himself on the blankets below, the other on Tristan's hip before he starts moving, hard as Tristan demands, fast and deep like his own body does.

It feels good to surrender completely to instinct, to fuck Tristan until his scent changes from desperate arousal to satisfied lust. To hear his voice dropping down into throaty whimpers as he nears relief, as the first of many satisfactions slides up his spine in a burning, heated touch, at the same time it takes sharp clawed steps down Galahad's own as if intent to join themselves in the middle.

It pours over Galahad like a splash of boiling water that leaves his skin raw and burning cold and sensitive. He drives his hips deep and a whimper crawls out of him as his knot swells - first tight, then almost painful as he stretches Tristan to the limits at his depth. It is like a fist holding tight, then tighter and his sighs are echoed by Tristan's racing, hitching breaths as he feels the stretch to pinching.

Galahad feels release ripple through Tristan then too, a pulse of his muscles squeezing and then releasing rhythmically. For a long moment it is too much for either, Tristan reaching back as if he could stop the growth of Galahad's knot, surging forward until Galahad whimpers at the yank, their bodies locked together tight and inseparable while they both claw the blankets up into a bunch in their efforts to come to terms with the sensation.

Finally, panting, Tristan finds the right angle for comfort - for Galahad's knot to grind pleasurably against his g-spot. For a time they both float through shuddering, hot-cold pleasure.

Tristan is stretched nearly flat and prostrate beneath him, and the sharp smell of his heat - not strong until Galahad was this close - has for now subsided under the base-earth smells of release and slick and seed. Galahad feels it as a change, the bond forming between them that will solidify over the next few days. A vibration pounding beneath his skin that will either settle him like flour settles thick in a container when pounded, or shake him apart at the seams.

Tristan shifts beneath him, pushing his weight up and over, until they settle on their sides. His hand strokes lazily over his own belly, just above his spent and soft cock and then he pushes down, compressing Galahad's swollen knot slightly and making both aware of it, of the heavy, full feeling.

"You said you'd show me _how_ it was done?" Galahad murmurs at Tristan's ear, earning a drifting chuckle.

"I'm hoping instinct will guide you," Tristan says, a mild insult but not one that's meant. He drums his fingers over Galahad's knot, earning a gasp at the reverberating sensation. Galahad feels too sensitive for it, for the squeeze around him. He has to hiss out a breath, feeling another, weak surge trapped somewhere between his tailbone and the base of his cock.

"I liked the idea," Galahad purrs in Tristan's ear.

From this close, he can see the way the corner of Tristan's mouth turns up in a satisfied smile. It is only a moment of calm before the storm continues, but enough for Galahad to suppose Arthur will soon have a pair of scouts rather than only the one.

Likely, none of the others will consider it unjust.

-

**Author's Note:**

> -Okay I know this is off the course for me, but I've wanted to play with these dynamics for a little while. That being said, while I am usually really open to requests, I do NOT take A/B/O requests unless you and I are on a first name basis (even then it'll take some give and take).
> 
> -I do not and will not ever write pregnancy of any flavor, it's one of my two squicks (the other being underage). 
> 
> -That being said, I hope you enjoyed this. I picked it up and put it down several times, a fact which my poor Beta (READER), Quedarius (archiveofourown.org/users/Quedarius/pseuds/Quedarius) noticed as I changed tenses and capitalization styles like four times over the course of this relatively short work. I owe cookies, big time. 
> 
> -The title is a reference to a quote from Elizabeth I, 'I find that I sent wolves not shepherds to govern Ireland, for they have left me nothing but ashes and carcasses to reign over!' Which just amused me, though I know it is contextually incorrect.


End file.
